YooHoo and Martinis
by vodka straight
Summary: I think I disliked her at that moment more than I ever have, even more than when we were both vying for the same boy... and I'm so glad that my life isn't about convenience or coupons or silence yet." Grocery Store, Amy's POV.


**This here story is in direct corollation to the Grocery Store by coffeeplease. That story was writen from Donna's point of view while she meets Amy again for the first time after having married Josh, toting his baby around a supermarket with a cart full of yoo-hoo. There is somewhat more depth involved than my explaination can account for, but you will have to read it yourself, for it is a delightful peice of work. Anyway, I read it and couldn't help but wonder about what Amy thought about their spontaneous little meeting. So I wrote it. And... here it is:**

**Yoo-hoo and Martinis**

There is yoo-hoo leaking all over her hands. Jesus Christ, the woman is covered in yoo-hoo. I look away, because that would suck and I don't want to be the eyes looking at her saying "wow, I guess that sucks" because in this case it means a lot more than just yoo-hoo on her blouse.

Donna used to be so slim; she used to be a rail. She was never, like, gorgeous, but she was always cute and lovely and spunky, and skinny as a rail, which was enviable. Now she had a strange, uncomfortable looking belly that seemed lopsided and wrong when you looked at the rest of her body: her slim shoulders and pointy features. She had a baby, weeping hysterically into an expensive cell phone on her hip, and I think I can here Josh's voice over the static of the line, frantic, fumbling Josh with his long angular body and his blunt way of telling you off; his righteous, desirable anger and his wild hair coupled with his receding hair line was on the phone, trying to satisfy his flustered wife by babbling comfort to a two year old that he couldn't really know that well. No one can really know a two year old. Maybe that's okay for parents, maybe their love really is that huge and full of magic, but I can't tell from where I stand.

I believe she thinks I'm jealous. The idea knocks me over with its ridiculousness, but I believe that that is the case.

I look down at my basket: martini olives and herbal tea. My boyfriend was at my apartment, slightly ill and for some reason unbelievably horny. He had a fever, and his face was pink and his hair seemed darker than usual, and his voice was rough because of his cold and he kept grabbing at my arms and legs as I got out of bed this morning, kept tugging me down towards his sick, tight, hot body that radiated with an exciting, unnatural wanting. So I had olives and herbal tea, and she had yoo-hoo, and who should be jealous of whom?

Although, it is vaguely true that I felt a tinge of jealousy just walking over there, just because she was holding Josh's baby, and it was a shared thing we'd had once, a race we'd both run back at different times in different states of mind. Back when I cared enough about Josh and his exhausting brilliance to ask Donna searching, mean questions that invaded any kind of privacy a girl could hope to have. I was prettier than her, and smarter than her, and more ambitious than her, and just more. I was one of those terrible, almost evil women who didn't understand that not everything could be seen. Not everything is something that you can glance at. I was the caricature of an elitist ice-queen, and I look back at myself then as a comic book character; Destruction and Humiliation Girl- men pine for her and believe she was the resolution and climax of their lives. She flies around crashing cars into telephone poles because she likes the crunching, metallic noise, and because she thinks that everything can be done over, nothing is permanent, and everything is a toy, with losing and winning and scoreboards like Joshua Lyman to keep track of it all. Maybe my imagery is a little overwrought.

But here, after feeling like I've come so far and learned so much about being a human being, I can still look at this faded, frayed, lopsided vision of a girl and feel so glad it wasn't me.

Jealous? I should be jealous of a lifestyle revolving around shit and vomit? A permanent commitment to something that isn't, in its deepest essence, more permanent than anything before it? It would take me thirty seconds to load my car with the groceries I've bought at eight thirty this morning. Thirty seconds, and another six minutes to get back to my apartment and my libido. I was suddenly so overwhelmingly grateful for six-minute trips and martini's and spontaneous, irresponsible sex and colds that aren't an inconvenience so much as they are a weird, inexplicable turn-on that would have me sick in two days and in bed with someone new in 80. I was suddenly so grateful I could cry.

Donna noticed I was looking at her. She gave me a nudging half-smile that made me know she thought I was jealous of her. She thought I was living a pathetic life. What a funny joke we've pulled off on each other. We both feel sorry for each other, and neither one of us is sad. What a good little trick we've pulled over on ourselves. I think I disliked her at that moment more than I ever have, even more than when we were both vying for the same boy.

Later, Daniel pulled me down into my sheets in the middle of the afternoon with the sun still high in my open window, and I felt him warm all over me until my brain just about exploded, until all the wit and grooming and charm flew out the window and I felt exhausted and sweet and heavy with satisfaction and false affection. I have never been so happy ever in my life, especially after having watched it all flash before my eyes at eight-thirty this morning in a super market, and I'm so glad that my life isn't about convenience or coupons or silence yet. I pray to god it never will be.

False affection is somehow still the best kind.

FIN


End file.
